


House of Ariadne

by WaterandWin



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan, World of Darkness (Games)
Genre: Alternate Universe - World of Darkness, Dark Fantasy, M/M, Magic and shit
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-05-24
Updated: 2014-05-24
Packaged: 2018-01-26 07:49:36
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,387
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1680461
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WaterandWin/pseuds/WaterandWin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Erwin and Levi don't run just any homeless youth shelter, but then again these aren't just any homeless youth.</p>
            </blockquote>





	House of Ariadne

**Author's Note:**

> If you don't know anything about World of Darkness, you're in the right place. There are a few terms thrown into this chapter, but everything will be explained in time. For now, this is just a little experimental thing that I wrote half of as a plain old modern AU back in March, and just recently unearthed, revamped, and added to, because man have I been neglecting actually posting any of my writing. Anyway, enjoy!

There’s a dog barking somewhere down the block, and sirens in the distance. A car drives by and its headlights swipe the parameter of Levi’s bedroom. The engine sounds guttural, like it’s been pieced together and mended up long after it should have stopped running. Levi listens to it slow down for a stop sign before roaring back to full speed and fading away into the night. The neighborhood is strangely quiet tonight. Levi can’t sleep.

The clock reads eleven minutes past two. He rolls onto his back. Erwin shifts in his sleep to make room, pulling the blanket half off Levi in the process. The night is still warm enough now that Levi just kicks it off the rest of the way and folds his arms under his head. Another car casts lights onto the ceiling, and then it’s quiet again.

“Why am I doing this?” he whispers to the cracks in the plaster.

Erwin makes a sound that might have been a question, but Levi doesn’t need an answer. He knows it anyway. He’s doing this because somebody once did this for him.

He rolls over again, this time nose into Erwin’s shoulder. Erwin wraps an arm around him automatically. It’s too hot in the room to be this close, but Levi doesn’t move to weasel out of it. He lays stiff a while, eyes closed, before finally shifting a leg here and a shoulder there until he’s more relaxed. He swears he can feel Erwin smile, but he’s too close to sleep to bother with looking up to check.

He doesn’t realize he’s dozed off until the phone wakes him. He’s wide awake with a shock but Erwin beats him out of bed.

“Ariadne Youth Shelter,” he says into the phone. There’s an edge of sleep even in his business voice, but Levi doubts anyone but a few would be able to tell. He sits up and rubs his eyes as Erwin flips through the roster on the table and nods along to the voice on the other end of the line. Then, with no warning, Erwin switches on the desk light and runs his finger down the page. Levi buries his face in Erwin’s pillow.

“Yes,” Erwin is saying. “No, yes, I think we can manage that. We have room.” He listens. “I can come by the station in thirty minutes for them.” Levi lifts his head again. “No, it’s no trouble.” He reaches for the keys off the nightstand before Erwin gets the chance. Erwin must have heard them jingle, but he doesn’t do anything to indicate as such. Levi rolls onto his feet and starts to go about getting dressed.

“Thirty minutes then,” he hears Erwin say into the phone before hanging up.

When Levi comes out of the bathroom five minutes later, Erwin is nowhere to be seen. Levi still has the car keys though, which means he’s probably gone to make up a bed for the new kid. Calls from the cops like this in the middle of the night are nothing new. They find these kids sleeping out on the street, they gotta put them somewhere. That’s where Levi and Erwin come in.

There are two new names on the roster. One of their surnames practically leaps off the page at Levi. She’s sure to be whole host of trouble, of that much he’s certain. Erwin was never one to shy away from starting shit, but this is a whole different level of bad idea. Levi zips up his sweatshirt and goes. Nothing to be done about it now. He trusts Erwin knows what he’s doing.

* * *

Sure enough, there’s two of them sitting at the station waiting when he gets there. A boy and a girl, no older than fifteen or sixteen each. They look like they’ve been on the street a few weeks already. Levi notices right away the bloody knuckles on both of them. The boy has a split lip, too, but the girl doesn’t look like she’s even taken a hit, so it's unlikely they were beating each other. Pretty mundane, as far as injuries go. The girl glares when she sees Levi looking at her hands, but he doesn’t bat an eye and goes back to filling the paperwork. The boy keeps trying to burn a hole in the floor with his eyes like it wronged him. The silence makes the clock on the wall sound deafening. Levi can feel someone glaring at the back of his head.

“Who are you supposed to be?” the girl finally says. Levi doesn’t answer her. “I said, who are you supposed to be?” she repeats a little louder.

“I’m not a cop,” he says without looking up, because he knows that not being a cop is sometimes all that really matters. Still, it doesn’t warm her up to him any.

“We already have a social worker,” she tells him.

One social worker, two kids? Levi wouldn’t have guessed the two were related, though the two of them being foster kids comes as no surprise. Levi and Erwin get lots of runaway foster kids through their doors.

“I’m not a social worker either,” he replies.

“So what are you then?” It’s the boy this time. Levi looks over the shoulder to see him glaring in his direction, too. “And don’t you dare say our friend, ‘cause you’re not.”

“Oh, you’re not going to be making too many friends with that attitude,” Levi says as he pushes papers back under the window to the officer. He looks at the girl. “Neither of you. Least of all with me.”

The officer looks through the papers and waves Levi over to the door so he can grab the kids’ belongings. He’s not surprised to find two beat up backpacks and nothing else. They’re heavy but he can sling them both on his back no problem. When he turns back, both the kids are on their feet.

“Those are ours,” the boy says.

“You’ll get back your shit-stained underwear,” Levi assures him. “Now get moving. We’re taking the SUV parked out front.”

They certainly don’t look like they trust him much, but Levi doesn’t expect them to. They’re not idiots. The boy actually turns to go but the girl doesn’t budge.

“Where are you taking us?” she asks.

“Why, you think staying at the police station is gonna be any better?” Levi snaps back. It’s nearly 4 A.M. and he doesn’t have the patience for mouthy brats. “Stay then, be my guest. I won’t stop you.”

“We’re not getting in the car with you,” the girl retorts. “We don’t even know you. You haven’t given us a straight answer since you got here.”

She’s clearly been in the system for a while to have so little trust for someone the police just signed her over to, but Levi knows the feeling. He’d been in her place enough times at her age. That doesn’t mean he was going to coddle her. He heaves a sigh and readjusts one of the backpacks.

“I’m taking you to the Ariadne House.” She starts to say something and he has to cut her off. “No, we won’t force you stay. But we have beds, and food if you’re willing to help out around the place. It’s better than the food at juvie, I can assure you of that much.”

She crosses her arms and holds her ground. For Levi, it's like looking in a fucking mirror to the past. Luckily for him, her brother is there to tug at the girl’s sleeve.

“Come on, Mikasa,” he says. “I’m sick of sleeping outside.”

This finally seems to sway her. She puts a hand on the boy’s back and steers him toward the door like she’s afraid Levi might molest him. He ignores this and takes the chance to get a good hard look at the two of them. Half of his suspicions are confirmed. The other half is just goddamn baffling. Erwin must be out of his mind. Levi heaves the backpacks higher and follows them out. He’s not sure which teenager he should be more worried about anymore.

* * *

The drive back is dead silent. The new girl glares at Levi in his rear view mirror the entire way. Her brother stares out the window like he’s memorizing the streets. Nobody says anything, not even when they pull up into the garage.

“Home sweet home,” Levi drones.

Nobody acknowledges it was a joke, but he didn’t exactly expect them to. They take their bags out of the trunk with all the vitality that betrays them for being nothing but a couple of sleepy kids. Somehow though, they still find the energy to bitch.

“How old is this place?” the boy asks, wrinkling his nose, as they step over the threshold.

“Old,” Levi answers, throwing out an arm to keep the two from going any further. “Uh uh, leave your shoes here.”

He gets an eye roll for it, but they dump their filthy sneakers against the wall. Levi pushes them to stand more neatly beside his own.

“And starting tomorrow, you’ll be in part responsible for keeping it running. We don’t house freeloaders. You don’t work, the system finds somewhere else for you to stay. Somewhere with more handcuffs.”

“Handcuffs? Oh, I’m so scared,” his sister deadpans.

Levi has bigger problems than this girl’s attitude. He leads them up the stairs and to the left.

“Boys’s wing,” he explains in a whisper. It’s not really much of a wing, just a stretch of hallway. “Girls are to the right. My bedroom is in the middle. It's the one with my and the director's name on the door. If you try to pass it, I’ll know.” He motions to another door as they go by. “Bathroom. Shared with the girls. Keep it clean.” They keep going. The brats at least take his cue to be quiet. Levi shoulders open one of the doors to reveal the boys’ bedroom. It’s a pretty big room, but most of it is taken up by three bunk beds. There are sleeping forms in a few of them, or at least pretending to be asleep. Levi wouldn’t believe for a second that they slept through Erwin putting sheets on one of the empty mattresses and didn’t decide to stay up and see who the new kid was. He points silently to the empty made-up bed now. The boy slips past him, but he puts his arm out to stop the sister from following.

“Where do you think you’re going?” he asks.

“I’m not leaving Eren,” she tells him defiantly. She’s taller than Levi is, which isn’t unusual in and of itself but it sure makes being taken serious a lot more difficult than it ought to be.

Levi sighs. “You'll literally be right down the hall.”

“I want to stay here. I can take care of myself.”

He looks down at the split skin on her knuckles, then at the other boys. “It’s not you I’m worried about.”

“Leave me the hell alone, Mikasa,” her brother hisses from the other side of the room. “I can take care of myself, too. You’re not my mom.”

The accusation carries a sting if her face is anything to go by. She retreats immediately, and doesn’t even so much as look at Levi as he leads her back down the hallway and to a nearly identical girls’ room on the other side. She shoots him a look as she closes the door behind her.

Levi waits to hear her footsteps retreat on the other side before he whips around and storms into his own bedroom. Erwin is in bed with his back to the door. He could very well be sleeping, but Levi flicks on the lights anyway.

“What were you thinking?” he demands.

Erwin groans and sits up. He rubs his eyes to adjust them to the light and squints at Levi.

“Don’t give me that look,” Levi growls as he paces forward. “An Ackerman? Now? As if we need the Ripper on our asses on top of everything else?”

“Not the first time I took in one of the Ripper’s,” Erwin points out. Levi scowls, but before he can retort Erwin adds, “what did you see on them?”

“Oh, that’s the real kicker,” Levi says as he stomps to the closet and hangs up his hoodie. “For one, she’s Awakened.”

Erwin isn’t the last surprised. “What as?”

“A Mage, obviously.” Levi continues. “I couldn’t get a proper read as to the Path. Frankly, I was too distracted by the aura around her brother.”

Erwin smiles.

“You _knew_?” Levi asks incredulously.

“There’s been some talk. I was curious if the rumors were true.”

“Curious? Erwin.” Levi drops himself on the bed. His previous anger dissipates into concern over just what goes through this man’s head. “That boy is a ticking time bomb. His first Change is coming. We’re talking weeks. He’s a danger to everyone around him. Are we really prepared to calm a raging Uratha?”

“Better here where we can get a handle on him than out there with the Sleepers,” Erwin replies calmly with a hand on Levi’s shoulder. The touch practically drains the tension from him. The fact that it’s half past four finally catches up.

“We have the house charmed from top to bottom,” Erwin continues. “Nothing, magic or otherwise, is going to happen without one of us knowing about it. In some cases before it happens, thanks to you. We can sort the rest out tomorrow.”

Levi starts to rise to turn off the lights but Erwin gets them with a flick of his hand and a small spark of electricity.

“Lie down with me,” he says.

Levi kicks off his street pants and does just that. His head fits naturally in the crook of Erwin’s shoulder. He’s vaguely aware of Erwin smoothing his hair into place, but he uses the opportunity instead to finally steal back his half of the blanket and roll away to the blissfully cool half of the bed. Erwin is too used to it to take offense.

There’s silence for a bit before Levi murmurs, “Okay, I trust your decision, Erwin.”

If Erwin gives him a reply, Levi is too fast asleep to hear it.

 


End file.
